The present invention relates to a surgical staple for closing or suturing a wound or incision, particularly a surgical skin staple adapted to be implanted in or through the skin to suture an exterior wound or incision.
Surgical staples having a central portion and opposed side portions with points or cutting edges at their free ends or tips have been used for holding tissue at the edges of a wound or incision together until sufficient scar tissue forms to firmly connect the tissue so that the staple may be removed. A staple of the type disclosed in DE-PS No. 26 25 991 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,662,939 includes a straight central portion and straight side portions each forming an angle of 90.degree. with the central portion. Such staples are deformed in a tool between a ram and an anvil in such a way that the ends of the side portions are bent around the anvil edges at an angle of 90.degree.. One disadvantage in the use of such a staple occurs during implanting. Since the staple tips tear rather than stab through the tissue to be joined in the region adjacent the wound during deformation of the staple, a large traumatic laceration channel is produced by each of the two side portions. There is the additional disadvantage that during removal the staple is not bent back to its original form, but is deformed in the central portion into the shape of an arc so that the side portions are bent up at an angle. The angularly-bent side portions traverse an unfavorable path through the tissue and freshly widen and injure the tissue. This process entails considerable pain for the patient.
Another disadvantage of a staple of the type disclosed in the aforementioned documents is that it is normally not suitable for stacking in a magazine having an arcuate feed path. It is often desirable in surgical staplers to use a staple magazine which includes a curved section through which the staples are advanced. However, staples of the above-described type cannot be used in such a magazine because, due to the substantially straight central portion of the staples, exact guiding and simple spring-biased advancing of the staples through the curved section of the magazine is not possible.